


Rise and Rise Again

by Arukou



Series: Tumblr Archive [21]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Iron Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: And Pepper is definitely an Avenger, Gen, Nightmares, Pepper Potts Feels, Pepper-centric, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, The Avengers don't sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-30
Updated: 2015-12-30
Packaged: 2018-05-10 07:47:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5577226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arukou/pseuds/Arukou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Night after night, Pepper wakes to ash on her tongue and fire in her veins.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rise and Rise Again

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](http://arukou-arukou.tumblr.com/post/125887783189/pairing-pepper-potts-natasha-romanov-pepper).

Pepper wakes with a gasp to the smell of smoke and a sizzle in her ears. Tony is on the other side of the room, hands up, gently chanting “Pep, Pep. Come on, honey. Pep.” She looks down to see that the sheets around her are charred black and her hands are still glowing red. She can’t remember the nightmare, but bile is sour on her tongue and chills of fear run down her spine.

“Oh god,” she whispers and scrambles from the bed, mirroring Tony’s posture, hands flung out in front of her. “Oh god, oh god,” she whispers, and flees the room, Tony calling after her.

After a frantic scramble through the penthouse, she makes her way to her office, orders JARVIS to put it on lockdown, and sits at her desk, her fingers laced through her hair. Five minutes later, the phone starts ringing, but she doesn’t answer. She breathes deeply, says “ignore”, and pulls up her desk display, studying the numbers for their first quarter projections.  

At five, she rises from her desk and heads back up to the penthouse. Tony is at the kitchen table, coffee at hand and projections dancing through the air around him. He swipes them away when she appears, and rises from the table, mouth open as though he’s about to say something. He says nothing though, and she studies the dark circles under his eyes; he looks like he slept as much as she did, which is to say not at all. After a moment, she turns and disappears down the hallway to shower and change into her work clothes. He doesn’t follow her.

The next night, she wakes before she starts a fire, heart pounding and voice caught in her throat. Tony’s beside her, heavy and unmoving, the way he is after he’s pushed his body past its limits. She runs a lone finger over his hair, tracing the line around his ear, and then rises from the bed. She doesn’t retreat to her office this time, but she does descend to the communal kitchen and make herself a cup of Bruce’s calming tea. It’s still nearly boiling when she drinks it down, but she doesn’t feel more than a tingle on her tongue. It’s like the ghost of Killian’s hands on her stomach, and she shudders, hunching in on herself. The towel in her hand starts smoking. She doesn’t sleep.

Pepper learns very quickly how to wake silently from a nightmare, an art that Tony never mastered. She slides from their bed and makes her way to the kitchen or the living room, working numbers and proposals until her vision swims. More often than not, she can never get back to sleep, and Tony emerges morning after morning with worried eyes and a silent tongue. He moves to rub her shoulders, to kiss her, to wrap her in his arms, but she can’t. Not when she might accidentally hurt him. Their breakfasts grow awkward and stinted, and Pepper doesn’t know how to fix it.

The afternoon Tony emerges from his lab with a phial, Bruce hot on his heels, he’s smiling the first real smile she’s seen on him in a month. “I think we’ve got it, Pep,” he breathes, holding up the tube of off-white liquid. “We tested with plants and rats. Full reversal.”

She looks between them, seeing Tony’s eagerness and Bruce’s reservation. “I would hazard an 85% success rate,” he says, removing his glasses and folding his arms. His smile is a little more haphazard, soft and fearful. “It’s not good enough for me, but ultimately, it’s up to you.”

Pepper looks back at the phial and shudders. “I need more,” she says, looking back up at Tony. His face crumbles and transforms, the sharp edge of his temper he normally saves for the press shining through. He says nothing though, and turns to stalk away, the worn shoulders of his T-shirt straining as he hunches in on himself.

Bruce remains and gives her another gutted smile. “I’m sorry, Pepper. He’s…He’s really worried about you.”

“I know, Bruce. I know he is.”

Tony doesn’t come to bed that night, and Pepper’s barely asleep thirty minutes before she jolts awake, the phantom slide of a needle in her veins followed by fire. The sheets are burning and she balls them in her bare hands until the flames choke out. Above her, JARVIS is silent, and she thanks him for not sounding the alarm. She doesn’t know what she’d say.

It’s another three days of an empty bed before Tony appears, shuffling his feet and refusing to meet her eyes. “I’m sorry,” he says, hands twisting behind his back. “I’m…I’m not being very helpful and I know you need…me. I…fuck. What do you need from me, Pep? I’ll give it to you. You know I will.”

She walks across the room, and touches his cheek bone with one bare fingertip. “I’m sorry, too,” she says quietly. “I never realized…I was callous. I should’ve tried to help more. To understand more.”

Tony shudders under her touch and looks up, his eyes huge and bloodshot in his face. He reaches to return her touch and she steps away, two feet between them. He freezes and then drops his hand again. “What do you need from me?” he repeats, looking strangely lost and small in their bedroom.

She smiles a sad smile and shrugs. “I don’t know,” she says finally, and turns to crawl into bed. After a moment, he joins her and they both lay awake, unspeaking.

Another two weeks and Bruce comes to her alone. “We’ve got it up to 95%. I feel it’s safe enough to try, but it’s still your decision.” Pepper looks at the phial he holds and feels the fire in her veins, the way it smokes and sparks at the edges. After a moment, she nods.

The needle in her arm is followed by the cool trickle of ice, spreading from the crook of her elbow to her heart to her lungs, her tongue, her toes. For the first time in months, she feels cool, and she sighs in relief. Compared to the transformation, the excision of the virus is shockingly painless. She stares down at her fingers for a moment and tries to reach for the fire; nothing happens. Bruce takes some blood to see if Extremis remains, but Tony is grinning from ear to ear, especially when she allows him to take her hand and kiss it.

They go to bed that night at 11PM sharp and make love, but Pepper can already feel it, even as Tony traces his hands over her rib cage. By 1 AM, she’s awake, her breath coming fast and the phantom scent of Killian in her nose. She looks over at Tony and realizes he’s in the throes of his own nightmare, twitching and murmuring in his sleep. “What a pair we make,” she whispers to herself, and runs her palm down his shoulder. He quiets after a few minutes, sinks deeper into the sheets, and leaves her in the world of the waking, goosebumps traveling up and down her arms. After a moment, she steals his shirt and steps into her underwear, wraps a robe around herself and retreats to the common kitchen for tea. When she drinks the scalding water, she burns her tongue and smiles in satisfaction at the bite of pain.

When Tony comes down in the morning, he meets her gaze with confusion and takes her hands up in his. “Talk to me, Pep,” he says, but all she can manage is a tired smile and a shake of her head. His mouth thins, and he drops his forehead to her knuckles, callused fingers tightening. “I’m sorry,” he whispers after a moment, and then he stands and leaves. Pepper can’t bring herself to be angry with him and doesn’t have the energy to feel abandoned.

* * *

 

Three nights later, Pepper comes down from the bedroom and discovers that the kitchen is occupied. Natalie, Natasha, sits at the table, her posture relaxed, two steaming mugs of Bruce’s relax tea in front of her.

“Natasha?” Pepper says, fingers clutching at the edges of her robe.

Natasha stands and walks to her, taking her hands and kissing each of her cheeks. “Rad tebya videt’,” she says, easing back after a moment. “I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch.”

“That’s fine. You’re busy with the whole…Avengers thing,” Pepper says, tossing up a hand. She smiles and laughs a little, but it’s forced and they both know it.

“Never too busy for a friend,” Natasha returns, and pulls Pepper to the table, sitting her down and pushing a mug to her. She bustles into the pantry and returns with the package of high-end Belgian chocolates that Pepper keeps hidden behind the granola.

“But why are you here? Do you need Tony? Is there a crisis?”

Natasha smiles a little, a tiny smirk that doesn’t quite reach her eyes, and settles into the chair next to Pepper. “I can’t come to visit my favorite CEO and former employer?”

“Natasha,” Pepper says, leaning back in the chair and inhaling the scent of the tea. It’s heady and sweet, clearing her nostrils with mint.

Across from her, Natasha’s face grows serious and she mirrors Pepper, holding the mug between her hands. “Tony called me.”

“Tony called you?” Pepper repeated, frowning down into her cup. “Why?”

“He’s worried about you, and he knows the human psyche is my specialty. Sort of. He has the emotional depth of a puddle, and he wanted an outside opinion. Or maybe just outside help.”

“I’m fine,” Pepper said, flapping her hand and inhaling more of the mint chamomile lavender scent. “I’m just…going through a rough patch.”

“When was the last time you slept the night through?”

Natasha’s gaze is knowing, and Pepper doesn’t answer. After a moment, Natasha opens the chocolates and holds them out expectantly, waiting until Pepper takes one before speaking again.

“It’s hard,” she says softly, looking out at the New York skyline, “being a woman in a man’s world. You and I, we’ve learned how to negotiate it, how to take all the shit they throw at us and turn it into gold. How to navigate like they do, and do it all in a pencil skirt and high heels. Sometimes it’s easy to pick up their bad habits too.”

“Natasha?” Pepper says slowly, the chocolate slow and sweet on her tongue.

“When was the last time Tony reached out for emotional support?”

“Just before Extremis,” Pepper says instantly, remembering the weight of his head against her stomach, the terror of the suit above her.

“And when was the last time you reached out for emotional support?”

“I don’t need…”

“Pepper,” Natasha says sharply, her gaze glittering and as precisely placed as a surgeon’s scalpel. After a moment she returns to the skyline, breath passing her lips in a near sigh. “I’m not good at it either. Reaching out. Asking for help. But I’ve learned when I need to.”

Pepper only knows the barest details of Natasha’s life before SHIELD, but she knows it was violent and horrible, just as bad as anything Tony went through in that cave in Afghanistan. Or perhaps even worse, because Tony’s suffering was only months, where Natasha’s was years. Pepper can’t even begin to imagine that kind of life, that kind of slavery. “What I went through,” she begins, looking down at the flecks of leaves floating in her tea, “it’s nothing. I wasn’t even….”

“Don’t do that,” Natasha says, less sharply this time, but still just as commanding. “Pain is not comparable. Your pain is not my pain is not Tony’s pain is not anybody’s. It’s yours, and if you hurt, it’s valid.”

Natasha lets her words ring in the kitchen, slowly sipping at her tea. Her gaze is on the glittering constellations of skyscraper lights, but Pepper can still feel her scrutiny, clinical and strangely welcome. After a moment, Natasha shifts, her feet curling onto the seat and her posture losing some of its rigidity. “Think about it,” she says, gives it a beat, and then says, “Did you hear about this new exhibit at the Guggenheim? ‘Swans’? I’m in town for a few days and I thought we could go together.”

Just like that, the conversation flips, and almost against her will, Pepper’s shoulders soften. She loves Tony, but at the end of the day, their hobbies occupy vastly different realms. Being able to chat about art with someone, it’s…freeing, somehow. Like for the first time in months, Pepper is sitting outside of the bonds that strapped her to that table.

At four A.M. they rise, and Pepper walks Natasha to the elevator. Just before she steps into the elevator car, Natasha leans forward and kisses each of Pepper’s cheeks again, before giving her a small, awkward hug. As she pulls away, she slips a business card into Pepper’s palm. “She’s done wonders for me,” Natasha says, “and she’s used to…unusual situations. Think about it? For me?”

Pepper nods and clenches her hand around the card, feeling the cardstock bend under the pressure of her fingers. When she slips back into bed, Tony wakes and turns toward her, reaching blindly. She catches his hand and brings it to her cheek, waiting until he opens his eyes to say, “Thank you.”

“F’r wha?” he mumbles, still barely conscious.

“Looking after me,” she says, sliding in closer to him.

He hums, but his eyes are already drifting shut again. Pepper doesn’t sleep, doesn’t dare. But in the morning, she stops between two meetings long enough to call the number on Natasha’s card. She doesn’t expect overnight results. She’s been running Stark Industries long enough, both from the shadows and from the CEO’s chair, to know that all great feats take time. But then, laying the cornerstone only takes a minute.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [tumblr](http://arukou-arukou.tumblr.com) for more fanfiction and nerdery.


End file.
